Security, Fire & Electrical Safety thru Common Sense not Political Correctness.
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Monday, December 5, 2011

Low Pressure device on Fire Sprinkler fails to do its job.

I get a call from the Central station I use early this morning and there receiving aWater Flow alarm on a sprinkler system at a local shopping plaza I service.Its a dry pipe system which has given us frequent problems over the years but since I put in proper controls and started frequent bleed offs of the system drip drums of moisture in over 3 years we have not had a problem till this morning.As i am getting dressed to be able to respond to the plaza the local fire chief calls and tells me where just leaking in pump room there's no damage . Good ill be up in few minutes and they lock up and I arrive and shut off the system valves and begin draining the water down out of the dry pipe system.the Fire dept should have shut off the OY&S valves but did not but other than a waste of water there was no damage done.I start looking things over what went wrong I should have gotten a call the air compressor was not working after the system looses 10 pounds of air before the system filled with water but thePotter Electric Pressure switch that was installed by sprinkler company never activated.I find after looking thru the panels log there was a power failure which is why the compressor is not working apparently there was a wreck nearby and power went out causing a single phasing condition which tripped its overload I reset the overload and the compressor is back on line no problems compared to when I first took over this plaza an ass of an electrician installed the compressors 3 phase motor with out proper motor starter combo switch and in days past they have had to replace the motor at least 4 different times till I found out the control was missing.and installed proper unit. so at this point all the water is drained out of the dry pipes and the technician from sprinkler company has arrived and resets the flapper valve and we test the low pressure switch and find it works which is strange why it did not do its job previously but he agrees as I do that Potter Electric is not turning out the high quality of sprinkler products they once did I personally refuse to use there products I have had so many problems with them seems that ever since they changed management and started making things over seas decade ago there products are very inferior and cheap pot metal they use cracks very easily .Its a shame they use to be the premier provider of sprinkler products but many dealers like me are no longer using them.Well the system pumped up we readjusted the low pressure switch put everything back to normal and called it a day. But had the Potter Electric low pressure switch worked the way it was suppose to it would have taken 10 minutes to fix things vs all morning.Unfortunately Potter electric is one of the few company's that make it, so your stuck using there products.

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Nick Markowitz is a Trade Writer, an Electrician and an expert in the Security and Life Safety Markets. With over 35 years experience. Here in his personal blog you will find helpful technical tips as well as personal comments and life experiences. Nick has over 1500 articles he has published in many different magazines ,websites newspapers and other media on many different subjects

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